Daily Archives: November 19, 2012

I’ve tried testing this idea with limited results but I’m not sure if I’m going about it the right way.

I want to establish a network of local people around the world who would be willing to show travelers and tourists around their town or city.

Yes it’s a rip off of AirBnB but hell, I couldn’t find one which was already established (there is one competitor which is actually validating this idea using a landing page, a youtube video and an email form).

Watch this 2 ½ minute video from the SumoBusinessBlueprint2 I made about this question, then continue reading this to see how to validate this idea before wasting time on it:

Ok, so I ripped up the idea in the video. Not a fan.

What Ken is telling me is:“I want to build a site for everyone in the world who travels, and have them signup to this service.”

SLOW DOWN COWBOY!

Making a site that needs allll these travellers to signup to be guides, or get guided….is hard. Especially if you don’t fully understand the market yet!

You think McDonald’s got big by starting with 10,000 stores?
NO SIR.
They started with one store and fully understood what people wanted.

You think Facebook got big by going for 1,000,000,000 users?
NO SIR.
They started at a single college and fully understood what people wanted.

So let’s learn from that and understand what people want first.

SO HERE’S ONE WAY KEN CAN VALIDATE THIS IDEA TO SEE IF PEOPLE REALLY WANT THIS SERVICE (if he’s not lazy and actually wants to put in the effort):Pay attention if you’re a Wantrepreneur.

Let’s first see if people are clamoring for this service…if they’re not, this is gonna be a really sucky business.

And since this business is based on real-life interactions,
Ken needs to do a real-life validation.

Step 1.) Make a quick flyer for this service. We’re gonna post the same flyer online AND offline.

STEP 2.) Post this flyer as an image on Craigslist under the section: SERVICES –> TRAVEL/VACATION.

STEP 3.) Then walk around your hood and post this flyer in some hostile’s or hotels. Talk to the people who run them. See if they can refer people your way. Maybe even offer them $20 per referral to get things moving.

STEP 4.) Actually show a couple people around town yourself. Was it fun? Was it worth it? Did they pay you? Are they gonna come back? Any surprises? Were they happy with it? Are they gonna recommend friends?

STEP 5.) Ask how they found you…..and if they use travel sites. Then start modifying the ad to see if you can get more success.

Modify and post that ad many times to see what really stands out. Here’s some sample headlines and sub-headlines to post:

SEE ALL THE FAMOUS NEW YORK CITY SIGHTS.All the famous icons in one tour.

NEW YORK CITY BACON TOUR.Eat the most popular bacon dishes in New York City.

NEW YORK CITY TOP RESTAURANT TOUR.Eat the top dish at the top 5 restaurants in New York in 1 day.

NEW YORK CITY PARTY ANIMAL TOUR.Party at the most exclusive clubs in NYC till 8am with a notorious party animal.

Who knows…..you might find out that the party animal tour is by far the most requested and profitable over anything else.

This means you could maybe start your travel website with “specialty tours” in mind…instead of the regular boring tours already out there.

That would be a unique and value-added type of thing.

I might spend $50 to get a crappy tour driving through Times Square and other tourist-y areas of New York. But I’d spend $1,000+ to hit up 3 insane clubs in NYC with VIP access and have the craziest, most celebrity-filled, alcoholed-up New York night possible with my friends.

So this real life experience will help guide your online site.

If you try to promote these tours, and nothing ever comes of it…..it might mean you should abandon this business idea and move on. Put a bullet in this idea’s head.

However if some of your tours start to take the hell off….YOU MIGHT HAVE HIT ON SOMETHING BIGGER!

If you’re blindsided by the success of something, it means you’ve hit on something.

With this idea validation method, several things have happened:

1.) You actually make some money taking people around the city.

2.) You find out what people actually respond to and will PAY for. This is huuuggee. Because if you start a business based that’s filling REAL wants and needs, it will work well.

A word about the psychology behind this:Now our test subject here (Ken) wanted to “just start a business about travel stuff”….but was he actually trying to provide value to a large group of people, or was this just a lazy-ass idea to make him some money?

You see….if you just wanna start a business because it “might blow up and make me a lot of money”, just quit.

EVERY SUCCESSFUL PERSON I’VE EVER SEEN GET RICH OFF A BUSINESS HAS PUT A LOT OF WORK INTO IT.

So if you’re doing something, put effort into it. Especially in the validation part where you’re finding out what people really get from your business.